LINK Thanksgiving Program Touches Thousands in Fairfax and Loudoun

Photo is courtesy of Kevin Wiggs.

Members of Sigma Mu Mu of Loudoun County, VA Chapter of the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity volunteered at Christ the Redeemer Catholic Church in Sterling on Saturday November 15 to support the LINK Thanksgiving Food Distribution program.

The men’s group managed traffic control for the steady flow of 55 family pick-ups an hour as shopping carts totaling over 50,000 pounds of non perishable groceries, and 750 pounds of frozen meat and 300 pounds of vegetables and fruit were loaded into needy family vehicles from our local neighborhoods.

LINK was able to provide 3-5 days worth of supermarket food and a grocery gift certificate to 776 families (3,880 people) at both Christ the Redeemer and Trinity Presbyterian in Herndon during the all day event. $22,310 in grocery gift cards were also distributed to registered families. 18 direct deliveries were made to home bound families by a dedicated group of volunteers. 33 walk-in families who came at the end of the day were also received.

LINK President, Lisa Lombardozzi stated, ” I want to personally thank each and every individual, school, church, scouting group, elected official, civic organization and business that helped make November 15 a successful LINK event day! The families who received the items are grateful and LINK is so proud to be a part of an amazing community! I want to thank the hard working LINK Board members and member churches who spent hundreds of hours of personal time to ensure the success of the program. LINK Churches will host the Christmas Holiday event on December 13th. LINK will need to collect more food to distribute as much of what we collected was provided to families. LINK will also need to collect 4,000 new toys for the 1,900 children who have registered with LINK for the holiday season.”

In a parallel effort, Sterling United Methodist Church (SUMC) also distributed 2,000 winter coats, hats scarfs and mittens at its fellowship hall facility. Amy Thomas of SUMC said, ”the amount of need surrounding us in our community is phenomenal—but as always, God is far more extraordinary! We know that we gave coats, jackets, winter wear, etc. to approximately 400 families. Each person was able to receive a hat, scarf and gloves/mittens as well. By God’s grace, we had over 250 new children’s coats from the United Way grant that LINK received. At the end of the day we ended up with 18 coats remaining on the racks (all adult dress coats). We actually had to give “rain check” coupons to a number of registered LINK families to receive coats at the December distribution event.” SUMC is currently seeking additional coats to distribute to these families on December 13th.